Tracing Art

I recently received an ask on my Danganronpa themed tumblr blog which asked me on my opinion on traced artworks and what my thoughts on them are in terms of tracing for personal use and/or posting them publicly. I initially thought my opinions on tracing would be completely negative- however that was not the case after thinking about it.

When I first started doing art, around 3rd grade or so, I did trace of off Pokémon colouring books I had. Of course, those were not posted at all and I don’t know if I still have any of them. Tracing as a first step to get used to drawing lines is not bad at all. However, it is important to be able to move away from tracing eventually. There is a limit to how much you can learn by tracing- it is only helpful in the beginning. Once you start exploring doing art without relying on pre-drawn lines will you actually be able to improve greatly.

If you really need to post art that is traced, you need to make sure you have permission from the original artist that you may post the traced piece. This is necessary due to automatic copyright laws on creative works. On top of that, please indicate that the image is traced. Treat this like it is a base or an edit where proper credit is due. As long as the tracer is not trying to get credit for something they did not create on their own, I believe it is alright to post.

In conclusion, I do not think it’s entirely bad to trace, though I do highly encourage tracers to eventually move on to drawing things from scratch, perhaps use references for the work if it is too intimidating to draw something completely from imagination. Slowly move to drawing on your own and that will help an artist continue to improve further. I hope you were able to find the answer you were looking for.